Art and theater reviews covering Seattle to Olympia, Washington, with other art, literature and personal commentary.
If you want to ask a question about any of the shows reviewed here please email the producing venue (theater or gallery) or email me at alec@alecclayton.com. If you post questions in the comment section the answer might get lost.

Saturday, May 26, 2018

My Fair Lady at Tacoma Musical Playhouse

For
a fun three hours of musical entertainment you can’t go wrong with a
well-staged production of Lerner and Lowe’s perennial favorite “My Fair Lady” –
even if you’ve seen it many times before. This one never gets old. And Tacoma
Musical Playhouse’s production is as good as any you’re likely to see from a regional
company.

The
story, adapted from George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion,” recounts what happens
when an arrogant, self-centered but brilliant professor of phonics bets he can
teach an uneducated woman who butchers the queen’s English to speak and act so
graciously as to be passed off as a high-class lady.

The
gentleman professor is Henry Higgins (played marvelously by Jonathan Bill, most
recently seen as Frank Abagnale Sr. in “Catch Me If You Can”). The “guttersnipe”
(Higgins’s descriptive term) is the poor cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle (Leischen Moore). The friend with whom Higgins makes the bet is
Col. Hugh Pickering (Gary Chambers). I can’t imagine better casting for these
three major characters. Bill plays Henry Higgins as snooty and full of himself,
but with a subtle undercoat of well-concealed humanity. Chambers, who has been
outlandishly good in many recent plays at Lakewood Playhouse, nicely underplays
Col. Pickering as one of the most down-to-earth characters in the play. And
Moore shimmers and captures the audience’s heart as the delightful Eliza. She
is funny and loveable, she sings wonderfully and handles the changes in accents
with ease – or seeming ease, as she probably worked like the devil to make it
look easy.

As it happens in many musicals, there is
usually some star-quality ensemble actor who stands out in the big production
numbers. In TMP’s “Catch
Me If You Can” that stand-out ensemble actor was Cameron Waters, and here he is
again as an unnamed drunk cohort of Alfred Doolittle. I could hardly keep my
eyes off him, especially in the song and dance “With a Little Bit of Luck.”
Watch for him to start showing up in leading roles soon.

What makes “My Fair Lady” so enjoyable is first
that the story, while being a bit of fluff on the surface, skewers the
pretentions of the upper class and pokes at the lower classes in a delightful and
non-judgmental way; and second because it is filled with great music. How could
you not enjoy songs like “Wouldn’t it be Loverly,” “Get Me to the Church on
Time,” “I Could Have Danced All Night” and “On the Street Where You Live”?

John Chenault’s lighting, John Douglas
Rake’s direction and choreography, Jeffrey Stvrtecky’s music and Bruce Haasl’s
sets hardly need mentioning, as they are always terrific. To that list of worthies,
I should add Jocelyne Fowler for outstanding costume designs.

“My
Fair Lady” is a long show at three hours, but the time flew by for me.

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About Me

I am an artist and writer living in Olympia, Washington. I write an art review column, a theater review column and arts features for the Weekly Volcano, a community theater review column for The (Tacoma) News Tribune and regular arts features for OLY ARTS (Olympia).
My published novels are: This Is Me, Debbi, David; Tupelo; The Freedom Trilogy (a three-book series consisting of The Backside of Nowhere, Return to Freedom and Visual Liberties); Reunion at the Wetside; The Wives of Marty Winters; Imprudent Zeal and Until the Dawn. I've also published a book on art, As If Art Matters. All are available on amazon.com.
I grew up in Tupelo and Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and have been living in the Pacific Northwest since 1988 where I am active in many progressive organizations such as PFLAG (Parents, Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays).